TONIGHT’S 7.30pm concert by the Ukelele Orchestra of Great Britain at the Grand Opera House, York, has sold out.

Although no date has been confirmed, the theatre management anticipates a further show being booked at the earliest opportunity for next year.

The all-singing, all-strumming players use instruments bought with loose change, and their philosophy since 1985 holds that all genres of music are available for reinterpretation, as long as they are played on the ukulele, be it Tchaikovsky or Nirvana, Otis Redding or a spaghetti western soundtrack.

Seated in a chamber-group format dressed in formal evening wear, they play instruments small and large, in high and low registers, whether performing intricate melodies, simple tunes, or complex chords. Their distinctive skill is to capitalise on the ukelele’s limitations to “create a musical freedom that reveals unsuspected musical insights”. Just what George Formby always intended!